The Language of African Literature - Ngugi Wa Thiong’O

Ngugi Wa Thiong’O (Pic:businesstoday.co.ke) 

The Language of African Literature 

Ngugi Wa Thiong’O says that he was born into a large family of a farmer. The community was like an extended family. He spoke his native language Gikuyu. Children listened to stories and retold the same to others. People who could make their stories alive and dramatic by using words and images were good storytellers. They used inflexions and tones effectively. He says that children appreciated the magic of words beyond real meanings. They enriched language with the help of puzzles, riddles and proverbs. Homes and farms were their primary schools.

After the Kenyan emergency in 1952, English became the language of education. Students who spoke the native language were humiliated. English was given the most important place n the apartheid pyramid structure of education. Students who couldn’t get better marks in English were made to fail even though they got distinction in all the other subjects. Proficiency in English ensured prominence in the colonial rule. Orature in native languages was stopped and English literature was encouraged. Language and literature took native Africans away from their nativity.

Kenyan languages were equated with backwardness and underdevelopment. Nguigi wanted to fight the colonial intention of detaching native people with nativity. Kenyan children should not grow up hating the tools of communication developed by their own communities and their history. He switched to writing in his mother-tongue of Gikuyu after seventeen years writing in the Afro-European tradition. He believed that writing in native African languages is a part of the anti-imperialistic struggles. He says that colonial alienation takes natives away from reality by distancing the language of daily use. The system separates mind from body and produces a society of headless bodies and bodyless heads.

Ngugi wants to bring back harmony between all the aspects of language and reunite the Kenyan student to the native environment. He wishes to see Kenyan languages carry their literature, culture and social nature. He says the Kenyan student can learn other languages without having any inferior complexes about their own language only after experiencing the richness of native language.

The Knowledge Society

Abdul Kalam - Former President of India

The Knowledge Society

A Brief Summary

Bharat Ratna, Dr A.P.J.Abdul Kalam is the former president of India.”The Knowledge Society” is taken from his book “Ignited Minds”. Kalam says that poverty can be wiped out only by mixing our past heritage and present-day knowledge.

According to Kalam, India is a land of knowledge and it must rediscover itself its past legacy. The foreign invasions and the colonial rule weakened India considerably. Knowledge has many forms and it is available at several places. It is in academic institutions, at workplaces, in learning skills from people such as artists, craftsmen, hakims, philosophers and saints. It is available from our heritage, history and epics.

Kalam says that Knowledge is important for prosperity and power. In India, we had the tradition of passing knowledge from guru to shishya. Foreign travelers wrote about our Ancient Indian Universities like Nalanda. Agriculture society changed as an Industrial society during the last century. Technology played a key role in the development of the society. In the 21st century, knowledge has become the primary production resource instead of capital and labour. Education, health-care and agriculture are taken ahead in the knowledge society. It promotes high productivity and prosperity creating new sources of employment.

Multiple technologies and suitable management methods must work together to create a knowledge society. India has left its impression in Information Technology and it will be much more developed in future. As a second component, young and dynamic leaders are required for establishing knowledge society. The most important mission for the knowledge society is India should become a superpower by 2010.

If societal transformation and wealth generation are the two important factors to make India as a knowledge society, a third dimension is to transform India into a superpower. Our communication network and information centers must be protected from electronic attacks. It is a great responsibility. Our cultural heritage should also help us in making India a superpower. (315 Words)

The Man in Black - Oliver Goldsmith

The Man in Black

The essay ‘The Man in Black’ is written by Oliver Goldsmith. It is a mockery of the then contemporary society. He attacks the social and political situation that dominated during Anglo-Saxon period in England. Oliver gives us reason for his admiration. It is that Man in Black appearing as something that he in fact is not.

The writer describes the Man in Black as a kind, sympathetic, and genial person with a compassionate heart. Outwardly, he seems unkind, looking like a rude, curt, and stern person. This is in contrast with his inner personality. In those days the English society considered the male population to be aggressive, manly, stern and chauvinistic. The dominance of males by their ultra masculine nature in the family is encouraged and accepted socially and politically.

Goldsmith discourages these stereotype aspects of male dominance in this essay. He mocks the way the society and politics of that time regarded male authority as prestigious and dignified. He wants to suggest that the trend of being ‘what you are not’ should not be encouraged. 

An Astrologer's Day - R. K. Narayan

R. K. Narayan

R. K. Narayan begins his story, ‘an astrologer’s day’ with a description of the astrologer. The astrologer works under a tamarind tree, on a busy road, in a park along with several street vendors. Though he has no special powers, he looks like a holy man with his saffron turban. Many years of practice and experience have made him a keen observer and a good judge of character.

One day as he is about to return to his home he encounters an unusual customer. The customer challenges him to answer certain questions. He dares the astrologer to pay extra amount in case the answers are not correct. The astrologer reluctantly agrees. He recognizes the customer in the dim light.  Addressing the customer by name, Guru Nayak, he recounts the customer’s past. He tells that the customer had once been stabbed in a quarrel and left for dead.

Guru Naik agrees and tells him that he had been saved by a bystander. The astrologer advises him to forget revenge.  He should go home as the man who stabbed him is long dead in an accident. He is relieved of his long-standing burden of avenging his enemy. R.K. Narayan reveals the twist in the story that the astrologer is the man who stabbed Guru Nayak in a drunken brawl.

The astrologer goes home and tells his wife that he has been relieved of a great load. He admits that he is relieved to know that he has not killed a man.